


Writing

by falsteloj



Category: The Great Gatsby (2013)
Genre: 1920s, Angst, Dark, Depression, Gen, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Unrequited, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-24
Updated: 2013-06-24
Packaged: 2017-12-16 01:55:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/856447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falsteloj/pseuds/falsteloj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are some things Nick cannot commit to paper.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Writing

**Author's Note:**

> Angst, angst, more angst. That is all.

Nick writes of anything and everything during his time at the sanatorium. He writes of his childhood, of his distant father and his overbearing mother, and long miserable nights away at school when he lay awake blinking back tears as he stared at the dormitory ceiling. He writes of afterwards, of meandering in a drunken haze from one place to another, of sleeping rough under the stars and of waking up to faces he had no recollection of.

He writes of the screaming he can hear echoing down the institution's corridors, and of the pale, wan faces he catches glimpses of when he's lead from his room to the doctor's office and back again. He writes of the war and the time he spent in the trenches, of the desolation and the despair, and the stench of death, sickly sweet, cloying in his nostrils.

Finally he writes of Daisy and Tom, and Jordan, and the Finn who had aired out his poky little cottage. He writes of his job on Wall Street, and of the feeling of being drunk for only the second time, and of how Catherine had tasted of lipstick and powder. He writes, even, of Gatsby. Of the power of his smile, and of his perfectly tailored shirts.

He commits the entire sordid business to paper and yet -

Still there are things he cannot bear to write of. The dark secrets that wake him in the dead of night, and proceed to haunt his waking moments so that he longs for the oblivion of drink so desperately it becomes a physical ache.

"Do you think you're holding back?" The doctor asks him, infuriatingly benign for all his knowing. Nick taps his foot rhythmically, unthinkingly, and refuses to answer.

That night he dreams. He dreams of his time at Yale, of the uncertainty and of the useless prayers he had proffered at the realisation. He dreams of stolen sinful kisses, and of the emptiness of watching those he had felt understood return home to marry their sweethearts.

At last he dreams of Gatsby. He dreams of the fluttering excitement every time Gatsby sought his company, and of the crushing sickness when it became clear that it had never been about him. Had only ever been about Daisy.

He reads that it's supposed to get easier. That his maladies are curable, and that time is a great healer. He reads other lies too, like the pictures they continue to paint of Gatsby in the newspapers. He reads that Gatsby was a murderer, and that he had only got what was coming to him.

"The Great Gatsby?" The doctor asks with one raised eyebrow, and Nick lights his cigarette with shaking hands. He can't say it, even now, and is both grateful and strangely disappointed when the doctor decides not to press him.

Gatsby was great. Generous, and naive, and beautiful, and a hundred others things he doesn't know how to articulate. He had looked perfect even in death, so perfect that he could have been sleeping. Could have been waiting for him.

He cries now as he cried then, broken and helpless on Gatsby's staircase, and when the tears refuse to come he picks up his pen and finally - finally - manages to write in a last, desolate scrawl,

 _I loved him_.

**Author's Note:**

> As ever, feel free to chat / hit me with prompts over on Tumblr [@serenwib](http://serenwib.tumblr.com/) or Twitter [@falsteloj](https://twitter.com/falsteloj). :)


End file.
